ATLANTIC CITY, N.J. — Recently eight residents of Columbia City traveled to Atlantic City to compete in the DEKA World Championships, with some even taking home top awards.
The event took place Nov. 19 and 20 in the Atlantic City Convention Center. DEKA is a Spartan race brand, and challenges athletes to a series of timed events meant to test their strength and speed. There are three main events including DEKA Strong, which has 10 different stations athletes must complete back-to-back. Then there are DEKA Fit and DEKA Mile, two events that add running portions between the different stations.
In order to qualify and compete, an individual must rank in the Top 12 for their age group and compete at different regional events to get to the World Championship.
The athletes who attended for Columbia City did so as part of the Journey333 Fitness team, a work out and training facility in town.
Those competing at the DEKA World Championship were Arrow Mullinax, Alice Herbst, Braewynn Neer, Felice Mullinax, Raquel Mullinax, Ricardo Mullinax, Ruth Ann Shively and Vicki Morgan.
“I think it’s very impressive that out of thousands of participants in the United States over the past year, Indiana is going to be so well-represented across many age groups and event types,” commented contestant, coach and owner of Journey333 Ricardo Mullinax.
The eight Whitley County participants joined others from different parts of Indiana – three from South Bend, two from Terre Haute, one from West Lafayette and another from Indianapolis.
Columbia City took home multiple wins at the event as well. Alice Herbst took second in the world in 55-59 age group. Felice Mullinax took the first place medal in the 14-17 age group in the DEKA Mile and DEKA Fit events. She took second in DEKA Strong. Raquel Mullinax was named second in the 10-13 female age group in the DEKA Strong event. Raquel Faires took third place in the DEKA Mile for the 40-44 age group. Ruth Ann Shively was fifth in the DEKA Mile for the female 55-59 age group and sixth place in the DEKA Fit event. Braewynn Neer was 15th place in the world for the female 10-13 age group in the DEKA Strong event. Lastly Ricardo Mullinax was ninth place in the DEKA Strong event and tenth in DEKA Fit for the male 45-49 age group.
“There were over 400 qualifying Deka events held with thousands of participants in several countries. Out of all of these, a maximum of 12 people were allowed to compete in each age division at the Global Championships. When you realize that scale, it is truly remarkable that Columbia City would be represented by eight people and almost beyond belief that our people would take the podium five times,” shared Ricardo Mullinax.
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